Government Road Hazards, Part 1: Cones of Danger

Last weekend I broke my bicycle. In the afternoon, I rode it to Cal State Fullerton to make use of their library as a study hall. Then, after a good few hours of programming on my webstore, which acts as a time-sink preventing me from ranting on this here blog, I proceeded to ride my bicycle back home.

Now, the brilliant road engineers at caltrans have been taking their sweet time updating one of the Yorba Linda to 57 North onramps. For the past month, at least, and quite possibly longer, they have left unrepaired a missing section of sidewalk. The curb remains intact, but the walkway no longer has one of its concrete blocks. In its place, the government road engineers have left a patch of dirt. But they thoughtfully installed some traffic cones to warn pedestrians of the danger.

Because of the thickness of the concrete, the dirt patch sits a few inches below the walkway. As a pedestrian, I would feel this to be a minor inconvenience, unless rain had made the dirt into mud. But that would still be just a regular inconvenience. As a cyclist, I had to use the sidewalk, due to an absence of a bicycle lane. I would rather not go over the sharp cornered bumps of the missing section of walkway, so I bravely challenged the thin sliver of curb.

On the way to Fullerton, I successfully navigated this section of walkway. But the sun shone bright at that time. After hacking on code for a few hours, the natural light seriously waned. Car headlights behind me proved unreliable and sporadic at lighting the sidewalk.  So this time, due to a lack of illumination, when I tried to navigate along that sliver of curb, I didn't quite line myself up correctly.

Then it hit me. That dumb traffic cone. Shoved the derailure right into the back spokes. I wasn't travelling super slowly, because I wanted to keep my balance. So the energy tore the spokes out of the rim, the bike and I slipped off the curb, and in the process seriously dented the back wheel. No way would I be riding home. I pushed the bike for the remaining 1.5 miles, rhythmically applying some extra effort every time the dented section of wheel turned through the back fork.

It probably won't do any good, but I'll be sending the government an invoice for the bicycle repair. The presence of the cones not only show their awareness of the hazard, and negligence for not repairing it, but also reveal a malicious intent to make the area more hazardous.